Riding School

Issue 007 - 2019-03-04

Lesson: Maintain mental health by spending time with those you love

I'm thrilled to have a guest author this week - my old friend Jesper Udby. Jesper completed our Entrepreneurially Course. He told me that it was worth the money he paid for it and the 5 hours it took him to study it. However, he added "I don't really experienced it as a course, more like a wise man sharing his thoughts and experiences about being self-employed." Well, Jesper is wiser than me, as his guest article today expresses. My children will tell you that I'm always on my phone. I will apply his wisdom from today. Kind regards from Heinz

Hi my name is Jesper Udby, I'm Danish (pardon my English) and have been working as an IT-professional since 1994 and as an independent subcontractor since 2001.

If you are like me, you have a family. And if you are like me, you hold the main income in your household. This doesn't make us rich as such, but enables us and our family to do stuff we wouldn't otherwise be able to.

If you ask the family what is the most important: The father or the money, I'm 100% sure they'd say the father.

And in order to be able to continue making money, one has to stay mentally and physically healthy. A lot of focus is put into the physical health: eat well, do exercise, remember to sleep etc.

But the mental health is at least as important. If you cannot think straight, you'd make the wrong decisions and you cannot work effectively as an IT professional.

I have a son and two daughters, both girls are doing horseback riding, both twice a week. I try to be there with them at the riding school as much as possible. At least once a week, sometimes even 4 times a week...

At the place I see other parents talking on their mobile phones or sitting with their laptops. I don't. My phone is muted and the laptop is at home. This is me-and-my-girls time. I'm focused on their work with the pony's and the actual lesson.

A while back, I'd had a very stressful period and could not really get to terms with going with my oldest daughter to the ridin gschool. I was home for whatever reason, just very distant-minded and grumpy. She insisted that I joined her to the place. When we'd been there about 30 minutes and it was time for her lesson, I was completely calm and relaxed.

Following my girl with her pony to the riding stables she looked at me and said: Look dad, it was the right decision, you are now completely relaxed. And she was right!

While earning money is important, being with your family and be part of what your kids or partner is doing is even more important. And it does give you the mental energy you need to work with the next customer or fight the next issue at your current assignment!

Remember to relax, remember to be alive and "in the moment", remember to appreciate your close relatives.

Kind regards from your friendly entrepreneur

Jesper

Living Entrepreneurially Archive

• 012 - Crashproof Your Business
• 011 - "Was weg ist, ist weg"
• 010 - Fear of Rejection
• 009 - Quality, Reliability, Be Nice
• 008 - Be Prepared
• 007 - Riding School
• 006 - Inner Dynamo
• 005 - The Fuel Light is ON
• 004 - "I filled it in exactly as your father did"
• 003 - The Espresso Machine Guy
• 002 - "Escape is Giving Me Bad Dreams"
• 001 - The Cleaning Fluid Injection Device

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